We've had a couple of days to play with the new ship. I was wondering what you thought about it. Also whats your favorite nickname for it?

WONDERFUL ship.

Very hard to kill, but at the same time, incapable of being much more than a tank.

and its more than just useful for personal trading. Its very good to bring along while pirating, it means we can collect the cargo AND MAKE MONEY!

Expect to see raiding parties bringing these along.

Oh, and my favorite name, which I think is the popular one.

The Moth.

I agree, "The Moth" is a superior nickname, and I would LOVE to see them accompany a pirate raiding party. That's the sort of player interaction I live for.

I love the ship! It just makes new people to the game stop and stare, heh, it's so great. I personaly call it the flying shoe. That's because on monday night on irc I asked what it looked like and a1k0n said it looked like giant shoe. And when I got the ship, it did! So that's what I call it, a flying shoe.

Wow that sounds like a really good idea shape...

That almost makes me want to take up pirating.. though my IA mates would ream me for even saying it...

I'm "Chaotic Good"! leave me alone!! :P

Finally! Something I can call real piracy! And then the pirates will have to defend the Moth Carrying a Shoe from swarms of VPR's & other anti-pirates. ;-)

Damn right,

Chaotic good :) that's kind've the way I've always thought of myself.

EDIT: this does, however, mean that if you're in a Moth, we will start shooting as soon as we see you. Just the mere chance of cargo would be worth it. Sorry guys, no warnings now.

Maybe not after you pop open a string of empty ones. No cargo.

Plus Pirates seem pretty dis-organized to me. I could be wrong.

I like the "beemer" as a nickname, although the Moth is nice too.

As for the ship, I love it. I've heard plenty of people saying that it's so slow that it's unusable, but I find it a great ship. If only they'd give it player-controllable turrets. :)

Love the Moth. It's exactly the ship I have been looking for.

My thougts on the moth are a bit more complex.

I love it, its a great ship concept, perfect for bulk trading.

I tend to think that it might be availible a few levels early however... i'd like to see it be at trade 9 or maybe even 10.

I am also somewhat concerned about the fact that it really is so much better than the marauder for trading. Seems kind of unfair to the UIT players, maybe if its level was higher or the marauder was availible at trade 6. Right now the maud doesnt seem very special to me.

On the subject of its speed. i'd say its speed is perfect, except for the turbo thrust. In a straight line it accelerates quite quickly.. combined with its armor that gives it a good chance of hitting 3Km and jumping to a station to repair if it comes under attack by anything less than a coordinated group of pirates. it's turbo thrust is 1500Kn incarnate said in another post, maybe reduce that to 1100 or 1200 to slow its acceleration down a bit more.
I know all the traders out there will probably find that idea distasteful, but those are my thoughts. taking one of these things into grey space by itself should be a very low survival prospect.

The last thing i would like to mention is the cost of the ship. the most i have seen it for is 20,000 credits. That seems low considering the trade/mining levels needed to get it. I was expecting to lay out 75 - 100K a ship for it, which would make it considerably more valuable to a player, and provide a good money sink as well. I dont think it would be overly expensive especially considering the potential for profit that the ship offers.

Plus, if it was worth something, players would be more inclined to stop and dump cargo and/or pay off pirates to prevent loosing the investment.

EDIT: and i definitely thing i like the nickname moth. its fat to type, and sounds more dignified than beh. beemer is cool rogue, but it takes too long to type.

"Chaotic good :) that's kind've the way I've always thought of myself."

But that's what any chaotic evil character would think of himself, too. In any story, there's a villain and a hero, but as far as the villain is concerned, *he's* the hero, not the other guy. Every villain is the hero in his own version of the story.

Hmm, does that make the corollary true? Every hero is the villain of the other guy's version of the story?

The thrust is high, but consider that that will be impacted by a heavy load of cargo and two large-port weapons. I've had good success with concussion mines together with swarms. I was able to dissuade solo pirates from tearing me completely apart with that configuration. They had no trouble catching up to me, and if they'd come at an angle - or if there had been more than one, I'd have been toast.

I use the moth FM. I still think the thrust is just a touch higher than it should be... its almost 3X the accel under turbo as it has normally.

All the moth needs is long enough to get to 3k, and it can go somewhere and repair... forcing the pirates to start over again in taking it down.

...and???

"On the subject of its speed. i'd say its speed is perfect, except for the turbo thrust. In a straight line it accelerates quite quickly.. combined with its armor that gives it a good chance of hitting 3Km and jumping to a station to repair if it comes under attack by anything less than a coordinated group of pirates..."

I completely agree Spellcast. I don't even pirate, but I think it'd be a lot more fun if it accelerated extremely slowly.

FM-Good point that the thrust is needed for carrying lots of cargo, but carrying cargo SHOULD give the moth a huge disadvantage. I mean, if something can carry cargo and accelerate almost like a prom, it shouldn't be called a "Bohemoth". I think the turbo thrust should be lowered slightly so that carrying 120 really makes it's acceleration take a hit.

Regarding the ship in it's entirety, I believe that the only way it will make the game more fun is if there is a large pirating movement to counter it.

When traders can make 200,000 credits in a single trip, the universe will become very lopsided (not literally...). Everyone who has the time will be millionaires. Millionaires will be able to buy as many ships as they want and burn them as quickly as they want. Everyone will be come caught up in careless PvP, where a fight will become meaningless. "Pshaw, 10,000 credits for the ship? Hah! I've got 10,000,000 to burn on it!" Players in Cents and Warthogs will throw themselves repeatedly against battle-hardened vets, who actually had to LEARN how to do PvP in order to not be poor. Players will not bother to become good, because what's the point when you can die as much as you want and never have to worry about going poor? The skill level gap between players, which is already fairly large, will become even more distinct and the vendetta community will subconsciously (or consciously) seperate into the "Pre-Moth" Fighters and "Post-Moth" Fighters. The enjoyment that all the players get out of the game as of now will come crashing down, when a veteran will enter B8 and have 20 "Post-Moth" fighters catapult their cents at them.

This is just a prediction. A very fatalistic prediction, but this was my first thought impulse when I saw the stats on the Behemoth. "Uh oh..."

The only way to combat this would be a huge pirating (or anti-trade) movement. We, as players, don't even have to be pirates...just make it difficult to trade. The Itani need to make Serco moth pilots quake in their boots...and vice versa. If we make it hard to trade, only those that are good at running will ever make enough money to be able to burn ships.

Also, if we make it difficult to trade alone, many other interesting and fun elements will develop. Escorts will finally become necessary, and a pilot carrying 120 heliocene will pay a good deal for a distinguished escort. Also, pilots won't always take the shortest route then. Sometimes, to get from Edras to Sedina, one might want to take the UIT route, then backtrack one system, as opposed to just flying straight through grey space.

So...those are my thoughts...Pirates, PLEASE PIRATE ME!!!=p

I flew a bunch of long distance procurement missions. You can make them in one trip! I hate to say this out loud, but it almost makes it too easy. You can make a single trip for a 2-5 jump procurement and get huge XP. Granted, I like it!

I'm surprised no one has mentioned mining. The lack of a small port encourages group mining, and if you're on your own, you can still get a huge hold full of ore in one trip, if you don't care what you get and/or you already know where to go. I parked in front of a 94% rich Heliocine roid I know about, turned on the beams and came back in 15 minutes to 120cu of heliocine, which sells for 1200-2400c/cu! Makes mining VERY profitable very quickly.

As far as combat, well, it's definitely a cargo bus, although the high armor means if you really want to you can still take on the slower bots, although, as someone else mentioned, the barrels are so far apart it makes it hard to hit stuff.

-tm

I agree with Spellcast that the trade levels needed for this beast are too low. At level Trade 8/Mining 4 it supplants both the Tung Mineral Maud (60cu) available at Faction +920 Levels 6/-/-/10/6 and the Valent Rev B Maud (56cu) available at faction +600 Levels 8/-/-/13/-. Both ships are now obsolete. Why work up to trade 13 for the Valent or even 10 for the Tung Maud when you can get the Behemoth at a much lower level and it's available anywhere/everywhere you happen to be. I would like to see the levels on the acquisition of both the Tung and Valent Mauds drop with the Valent being available at level 8 or 9, the Tung being available at 9 or 10 and the new Beemer available at 12 or 13. It's too much ship to be available at such a low level.

Regarding turbo thrust, leave it be. It's fine the way it is. Yes, it accelerates well enough but tops out at 190 and turns like a supertanker full of oil. There little chance that this beast will become the next Prom. It does not need to be nerfed.

It could use a small port for a mineral scanner.

In the oldish days it was extremely easy to make money ...(to give you an idea...400 000c in about half an hour of trade runs in a Centaur between the s5 outpost and s9...with virtually no risk of pirates.) and then there was the lottery, which if you knew how to manipulate it correctly could easily net you 40 000 000 for a few thousand credits in tickets. This was coupled with the fact that every ship was available to everyone at all times, so if you had the money, you could have the same equipment as the really good people. Anyway...where was I going with this...oh yes. So anyway, back then certain people were known to call Vendetta by the affectionate nickname "Space Quake," and for good reason, obviously. My point here is that Vendetta survived for what, 4 years? And was good enough as Space Quake to convince a considerable amount of vets to stay and continue after release. So, my friend, do not fret. Vendetta shall always survive.

uber-cool ship! :D thanks devs!